Saturday, December 29, 2012

When Peter the Great's son Alexis went to Dresden in 1712 to marry a German princess, the Elector of Hanover Ernst August noted with distaste in a letter to his wife that the Czarevitch shat in his bedroom and wiped his backside with the curtains.

Sunday, December 23, 2012

Kelly Osbourne
Yeah. I'm slightly ashamed and surprised for putting her here as well. I laughed at her during their awesome tv show. I laughed at her when she tried singing. I cried when I realized she was serious about the singing. But I've never found her all that attractive. And I still don't, really. However, I will give her all the praise in the world for turning herself around like this. It sounds like she has found a great place in her life and is happy to stay there. Throw that on top of losing all that weight and I have to give that body it's due. Here body looks damn good and she deserves my BotD award. Which I'm sure is why she did it in the first place.

Wednesday, December 19, 2012

Tis a good week to be an Avengers fan so let's throw the spotlight onto those that stuck out.

Avengers #2 - We Are Avengers
Ex Nihilo, while claiming to not be a villain, gives a great villain's speech about how much he isn't a villain. Turns out that the creators of everything created the Alephs to go kill off those creatures not worthy enough for the progress of creation. Once one is found, that when Aleph present their eggs. No two are the same and this Aleph gave us Ex Nihilo and Abyss to break or transform that which they encounter.
Also we get Steve and Tony in flashbacks setting up the new team.
While issue one was in-your-face amazing to get your attention, issue two is a bit slower to help further set the new stage. Definitely still a big winner. Great start.

Captain America #2
After attacking Arnim Zola and his labs in issue one, Cap was imprisoned in Dimension Z with the child that Zola had.
One year later, Steve is surrogate father to Zola's son and they try to survive day to day in this harsh environment that is always changing. Attack followed by attack followed by attack followed by more attacks, Cap and young Ian are taken captive by a civilization of monsters/creatures. Not knowing what they saying other than the word "Zola", cap watches as they behead others with his shield before taking you Ian. End issue before we see what's next.
Rick Remender is moving relatively slower in this title but it's still damn good. It's very much a Kirby-feel title and worth reading, though it is still a little tough to see how it's gonna fully read.

Hawkeye #6 - Six Days In The Life Of
The Bro Baddies come after Hawkeye, telling him they wan their building back and he has 24 hours to leave before they kill everyone in it. This is how Hawkeye spends the days around that. Trying to hook up DVRs with Stark, getting beat up, fixing problems he accidentally caused, getting more beat up. Most importantly, not running from tracksuit Bro-thugs. In one single page, we see why Hawkeye deserves to be an Avenger.
This is quickly becoming one of the best single-person oriented books out there. Fraction is doing an amazing job making me love Hawkeye. I've said it before and I'll keep going with it: Hawkeye shouldn't be this damn awesome.

Thor: God of Thunder - The God Butcher: part 3
Modern Thor takes up the Hunt for Gorr, forcing him to seek the cave where he and Gorr once fought. The place where Thor nearly died and he thought he had killed Gorr. Turns out that Gorr has been waiting for Thor after these thousand years and isn't happy. It also turns out that whatever happened in that cave the first time, may also be why Gorr is on his kill-everything-immortal bender.
This book has been dark and amazing since Jump Street. I can't say anything bad about this series yet.

Thursday, December 13, 2012

Die Antwoord - Fatty Boom Boom
A while back I posted a video for these guys and their song Enter the Ninja. Well now I've found this video and it's even more catchy and even more messed up. Yet I can't stop listening. I think I may like these guys.

Wednesday, December 12, 2012

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles #17
To stop Krang from taking over Smada City on Planet Neutrino, King Zenter needs Professor Honeycutt back. Problem is, his body is dead and he is now Fugitiod and on Earth. Long story short, they get him but accidentally get the Turtles as well. Bring on the interplanetary war!

Before WatchmenRorschach #3
Rorschach is a little crazy and wants to beat the hell outta Rawhead before Rawhead does it to him. Too bad the guy killing all the women is still out there. Not much story but it's awesome, crazy violence.Dr. Manhattan #3
Manhattan realizes that all these alternate lives of him are all splintered from him and one choice. So he travels back to make sure that all the correct choices are made to correct the timeline. Will it work? I'm gonna guess not.

Ultimate X-Men #20
Having freed the mutants, Kitty is the leader of mutant kind (being only about 20 left after the government offered all a cure) and has inner trouble. They have a reservation they were given to live on but some mutants don't agree with her and her choices. Hopefully she can win over the majority before one of them kill her.

Green Lantern Corps #15Having been stripped of his Ring and title, Guy Gardner decides that if somebody like Batman doesn't need power to help, neither does he. After shaking the right trees, he gets a lead to a big arms deal. He Lone Rangers himself in only to find out that he has just ruined a huge police sting. His own cop sister is the own left to handcuff him and arrest his jobless ass. Guy can never catch a break.

Age of Apocalypse #10
The Resistance may have found a way to separate Logan from the god-power that is Apocalypse. In the hope of doing, it, Sabretooth blows himself up to give Jean Grey the time to be brought in. Her marriage to Logan may be the key in but her tenacity and leadership is the real reason she's been kept around. Hopefully she survives long enough for it to be true.

Winter Soldier #13Stupid Bucky went and got himself all mind controlled again. Which lead to some great fighting and great insight/writing but not much story progression. After he's brought back, he, Wolverine, Captain America and Hawkeye all set out to bring back Black Widow from her mind control (which was the initial story after all).

Artifacts #23
Tom Judge, after fighting the demon, is taken in
along with said possessed man by the police. After excising the demon,
he knows that it's just of things to come and that the Angelus is the
big worry. Not much story this issue but great lead into things that
should be coming.

Thursday, December 6, 2012

For some reason, people are loving Dan Slott's Amazing Spider-Man but I find it utter cow pie (pun intended). It's regressed the character back to the flimsy gimmicks of the 90's. On top of that, I can't get over the blatant inconsistency of the newest hero it introduced, Alpha. Peter somehow created this kid after an experiment of his was sabotaged and it gave the kid alpha-level powers (which apparently is a first in the Marvel U and makes him the most powerful..... cough-bullshit-cough). But here's how they explained what he can do (in a nice collage I made):

Here is the only limitation that he has:

Now here's how he took down the monster at the end:

With one punch! That's at least flight and super-strength. On top of that, I would say it's also safe to assume his force-field was intact since the gigantic impact didn't liquefy him on impact. That's a count of three powers at once, in my opinion. And one issue later, we're reminded by the Jackal (who is back and cloning again. Hello 90's my old friend...) that he can only use one power. Now, I know that stories are inconsistent all the time but they're usually not done 13 pages apart. Maybe most people allow that kinda shit to happen but not me and especially not with an "alpha-level" hero introduced in that same issue. Somebody needs to tell Marvel that Slott sucks and that I shall continue to hate it until he leaves. Which is likely to never happen.

Wednesday, December 5, 2012

Avengers #1 - Avengers WorldWritten by Jonathan HickmanDrawn by Jerome Opena
SPOILS BE AHEAD
Marvel kicks off their twice-monthly, Marvel NOW launch of the Avengers by bringing on the amazing Hickman (who made the Fantastic Four relevant and badass again) and Opena (who stunned the art world when Marvel brought him to Uncanny X-Force) to their billion-dollar franchise and it couldn't have been a bigger hit.
As the issue begins, we start at some point in the future, talking about how things have changed and what events may have been the start. As it brings us back to present day, we are told it all started with two men and an idea of being bigger. That if things are going to continue escalating, that the Avengers must be bigger in order to confront it.
We move forward one month to find new baddies, The Garden, on Mars after they have terraformed it, turning the red planet fully green. Seemingly lead by Ex Nihilo, he, a robot named Aleph and a lady who smokes black (think the smoke monster from LOST but human... Kinda...) have launched a bomb at Earth that will do exactly what they did to Mars in the hope to build a new world. Charge in the Avengers: Cap, Iron Man, Thor, Hawkeye, Widow and Hulk. They first stop the "origin bomb" and then go after the attackers. Though it wouldn't be a very creative start if that were it. After defeating all the Avengers, they take the beaten body of Captain America, strap him in the quinjet and send him back."These heroes were the best you had to offer. And they were found... Wanting."
Three days later, Cap thinks back to the conversation he and Tony had about being bigger. What that gives us may be the coolest, three-page ending in a comic in a very long time;"It was a summoning. He was the first -- our very best. So when he called, what hero would not answer? It started with an idea. The spark that started the fire was expansion. Our captain spoke, and gave the idea form. He said the words, and made it real. He said...Assemble at dawn.And how could we not? We were Avengers."This issue was brilliant. I can't say it enough. It had every beat you would expect and so much more and even when you were expecting it, Hickman delivered on a level that is rarely seen. When we get that final page (side picture), I had my goosebumps pecking for more. Here were our boys, in war and in trouble and Captain America just gathered the cavalry for the rescue charge. All we needed was the "dun dundun-duuun dun" music that plays when the helicopters come in to save the day in every war movie (and whose name is not known by anybody). This is the Avengers any fan could want and yet a completely new one that everybody should be reading.
For me, this is hands down the best Marvel Now start so far.